Garden City uses Humvees to help responders in snow

Garden City used its two surplus military vehicles to plow through streets during the snowstorm. The Humvees allowed first responders to drive down streets with drifts as high as four feet without fear of becoming stuck.(Photo: Robert Muery)

When Mother Nature inflicted her wrath with 13.5 inches of snow on Garden City, Police Chief/City Manager Robert Muery mobilized.

The Detroit area was hit with a 30-hour snowstorm which dumped upward of 10 inches of snow. Detroit Metropolitan Airport reported a 16.7-inch snow total.

During the height of the storm, Garden City road patrol officers devoted a great deal of their time to patrolling streets, while keeping an eye out for disabled and distressed members of the motoring public.

"We were able to assist several drivers who had become lodged in the snow," Muery said. "We reassigned my vehicle, which has four-wheel drive, to the road patrol for use in responding to emergency runs."

"We activated two vehicles we obtained from the military, which are often referred to as Humvees," Muery said. "These are work horses and can pretty well move through anything. These vehicles were obtained free of charge through the military's surplus equipment program and are often criticized as a symbol of the 'militarization' of police departments."

They were obtained with the intent of using them in emergency situations, when normal patrol cars might not be up to the task.

"So far, they have been used to move trees out of the road after a windstorm, allow police response in certain flooded areas and during this snow event," Muery said. "The Humvees allowed first responders to drive down streets with drifts as high as four feet without fear of becoming stuck. They performed well."

Lower volume

The weather seemed to cause a lower than normal volume of calls. "We only took one accident report during the 30-hour period between midnight Saturday night and 6 a.m. Monday morning," he said. "As the Super Bowl was occurring, we did respond to a few alcohol-related disputes that got loud."

Muery also notified various news agencies at 9 p.m. Saturday night that a snow emergency would become effective at 5 a.m. Sunday morning. "We did this so that the various newscasts could help get the word out in time," he said. "We wrote 42 tickets for violation of the parking ban and continue to write them."

In the meantime, Garden City continues its snow emergency. During a snow emergency, parking is prohibited on Garden City streets. Vehicles may not be put back in the street until the snow emergency has been canceled.

Notification of a snow emergency and its cancellation can be found on the Garden City website at www.gardencitymi.org and on GCTV.

Garden City offices are expected to reopen Tuesday. Garden City Hall, 21st District Court, the Garden City Public Library and the Maplewood Community Center were closed Monday.

Trash pickup will also resume Tuesday.

The Department of Public Services, the police department and fire department were open as usual.

Fire response

Garden City Fire Capt. Derek Laperrier, who was just coming off a 24-hour shift at 8 a.m. Monday, said that the department had about the same number of runs as usual, but the snowfall made everything more difficult. Some vehicles stuck in the road impeded the firefighters/paramedics from getting through quickly.

"In some cases, we had to first push them out," he said. "It took us longer to get a stretcher in and out."

Laperrier said that the department responded Sunday to a vehicle fire on Helen and, by mutual aid, to a small apartment fire in Westland.

He also gave kudos to the Garden City Department of Public Services.

"They did a great job," Laperrier said. "Without their help, it would have taken us longer."

Department of Public Services Director Kevin Roney was pleased with his department's work Monday morning. When he drove into Garden City, he noticed that even the intersections were cleaned, unlike others outside of Garden City.

"We are ahead of the curve," Roney said.

In tackling snowstorms, Roney said that his department divides the city into six sections and has a truck in each section.